Kenya rugby 7s team Shujaa put on a gritty performance to win the opening leg of the 2024 HSBC World Rugby Sevens Challenger series in Dubai.

Shujaa saw off a resilient Chile team 12-5 to claim the title, making a perfect start to their bid of returning to the World Rugby Sevens Series.

Kenya's danger man Patrick Odongo who has been in electric form all weekend opened the scoring for Shujaa with co-captain Tony Omondi adding the extras to give Kenya a 7-0 lead. 

A series of handling errors allowed Chile back into the game with Benjamin Videla punishing Kenya with an unconverted try to reduce the deficit to two points heading into half time.

Kenya's resilience and heart to win shone through in the second half as they put on brilliant defending to keep the Chileans at bay.

The mercurial Patrick Odongo assured Kenya of the win as he went over the white wash once more to extend Kenyans lead to 12-5.

The Kevin Wambua charges showed good game management as they saw off the game to claim the title.

In the earlier ladies final, Kenya fell to a majestic Chinese side who served up a perfect revenge having been beaten by Lionesses in the group stages.

China flew off the blocks with the experienced Chen Yei scoring their opening try of the match and Gu Yaoyao got the extras to lead 7-0.

They quickly scored their second try through Yan Meiling with Kenya visibly out of breathe and barely surviving.

Kenya rallied back to score a try of their own through Sharon Auma although Grace Okulu couldn't get the extra two points via conversion.

China put the game to bed late in the second half as Dou Xinrong got herself the perfect gift for her 27th birthday by going over the line and secure the title for China who were making a main cup final appearance for the first time.

Shujaa now lead the Challenger Series standing with maximum 20 points while the Lionesses are second in their category with 18 points.